Who R U?

Greetings Detlof,
Is there a correlation between Tubes and mental health? I suspect harmonic "rightness" and psychic "rightness" are like hand and glove.. Any thoughts? Kindest regards, Larry

Greetings Larry,
I like your thought and I do agree, that when we feel "right", we are indeed in harmony with ourselves. I also agree, that the midrange harmony my tube gear will bring, invariably will put me back into feeling "right" no matter how my day has been. Music indeed can soothe the savage breast, and tube gear is amongst the most musical.
Remember the early CD's Larry? They invariably had the contrary effect on many people, who would feel not "right". I have a bit of experience with music therapy of both psychotic and depressive patients in a stationary setting and I would say that in both cases music often had a short term "rightening" influence. We used music from Bach's "Well tempered Clavier" because of its stucturedness and and its harmonic nature. Unfortunatedly it never got over an experimental stage, but I remember some interesting and rather touching moments. You know, your thought feels spontaneously -intuitively just perfectly "on the dot", though I don't doubt that good SS-gear will have the same effect, if its musical. That is what counts. If I listen to my SYSTEM, I generally feel not right, but if my system draws me into the music and I can forget about it, then deep contentment and happyness is close. A wonderful thought, Larry, thanks for bringing it up and sharing it with us. Warm regards,

Oh Larry, don't you think, your thought would make a nice thread for others to comment as well? Just an idea...

OK, I'm gonna jump in. I'm 57. At 26 after successfully dogging the draft, I was laid off at Boeing. Then my girl friend dumped me so I moved in with a odd but interesting new friend of mine. I cleaned his house and he got the big tube amp I had built working. He was trying to build the worlds most powerful transistor amp ..... looked like fun to me, so he made me his partner. Ten years and a lot of stories later Phase Linear was sold to Pioneer. I had a 36' foot cutter built and went sailing for five years.

I got the itch to do something again somewhere in Costa Rica. Co-founded Heart Interface which built power inverters. Wasn't happy with that, so, with three friends for partners, I started Trace Engineering. This company also manufactured power inverters primarily for the alternative energy market. Trace did well and with 250 employees we sold a few years ago.

I ride my recumbent bike alot and still sail although mostly on sailboards in the Columbia gorge. I became a pilot five years ago and love to fly. Learned to fly helicopters recently and fly an R-22 from my backyard almost everyday. I am presently leading a happy life of meaningless self-indulgence.

Great post Dave. I'm 38. I have wife and 2 children (boy and girl, 6 and 8). Been married for all most 15 years. I've been a manufacturing engineer for all most 17 years. I live in western NY near Buffalo. I've been into audio since I was 12 years old (I moved my parent's console Philip stereo into my room and hooked an 8 track tape to it - the phono didn't work). My first real system consisted of Adcom 545 100 w/ch amp, Adcom preamp, Adcom CD, Snell E3 speakers, and Monster Cables. I moved up to all tubes (Golden Tube), B&W speakers (P5), CAL CL-15 CD and Audioquest (Forest and Lapis). I'm now using SACD, DVDA, Aloia amp/preamp, Talon Khorus, Aurious MIBs, and Audio Tekne and BMI cables. I can't believe I've spent this much on equipment in the quest for the best sound. Its been a long journey that I feel is near the end (waiting for Sistrum platforms for Talons and modding the SACD). I have "enjoyed the music" along way but my next project will be discovering all of the good software out there. I've been hooked on Patrica Barber, Diana Krall, Holly Cole, Rebecca Piegon, and Kendra Shank (Afterglow). I also like most Jazz (Miles, Cole, Adderly, etc) and particularly like the DMP Jazz recordings on SACD. The forum on Audiogon has helped me alot. I've received good advice and have excellent sources for info. I'm glad to see the negative posts have decreased. Based on Audiogon, I've made a friend in Canada who has turned my on to better music and equipment. David99 also sent me some good info on music. If there is one thing I can say, when we audionuts talk, we have our own language and we tend to share alot in common. This post is great because it allows us to get to know the guys posting in the forums better. Thanks, Mike Girardi